This is probably the most fun mission of the whole game (with Scorched Earth, 108 a close second). Tons of enemies, tons of NPCs and 3 NPC exoskeletons with 1 backup for each taking its place if he dies. The AR with its amazing heavy arsenal has a extreme edge over other classes here. I was having a ton of difficulties dealing with this mission in inferno because of a stupid stubbornness, but thankfully lemonleafier showed me the light of the general issue I was having. To avoid problems absolutely DON'T capture any NPCs. At least at start.
Ideal weapons:
- Heavy Bomber Phobos Z Plan 4, but Heavy Bomber Phobos Plan 4 will work too. The goal of them is to destroy small stuff in wave 2, perhaps kill a few colonists and annoy cosmos, but mainly to level down the city to make it easier for your NPC tanks and exoskeletons to kill enemies, as they will have no places to hide. Combat Bomber KM6 Plan X5 will also be nice, but it doesn't destroy the city ππ
- Bulge Laser Beam Mode Z, or the highest Bulge Laser you have. This will be to kill a few heavies, but mainly the laser cosmonauts from wave 3 and one of the large anchors. It's important to only waste time killing the 2nd and 4th laser cosmonauts from the left of start position as the other 2 will likely be eliminated by scripted bomb attacks. You can also try a Spritefall instead but not as useful as the beam here, as I'm positive that even a upgraded one will not be able to destroy the anchors in one use.
- 150mm Cannon Ξ½ Lapis will be stellar here. It enables you to destroy easily trees and other scenery ro cleanup and avoid blowing yourself, 2 buildings (left and right of the place where the WD squad will be) in front of you that will hinder your view, the train overpass, other buildings, cosmonauts, colonists, anchors, etc. The big advantage of this weapon is that it's focused, so you avoid hitting your troops, and it destroy things, unlike the Vulcan.
- the best exoskeleton you have. I do prefer the Powered Exoskeleton Nix ZC, as this one will be able to handle most problems if things go berserk. The Nix Red Guard is much faster but you'll be in trouble if too many heavies happen to survive at the very end as he can't handle them easily. However once you get the hang of the mission it becomes much easier and Red Guard is more than viable as you'll probably just walk around in the end.
Weapons don't have to be fully upgraded to succeed.
Armor: 1000+
Can be done with base armor, but due to how hectic the mission is, it's difficult not to be hit, specially by the rocket heavy colonists or a daring fast colonist your NPCs will ignore. Do remember colonists that are near a colonist you'll hit will focus weapons and attention on you until any of the NPCs hit them again.
Plan:
The best place I found to stay is the slightly higher area just left from start, left from the rocket equipped rangers (don't capture them). Destroy the trees there and the 2 structures to avoid surprises. Destroy the 2 small buildings just in front of you, on each side of the WD squad.
You should focus your attention on the left side, as more big enemies will come from there. Use the Phobos on the left enemy group that will be mostly colonists, when they're near. Use beam on heavy coming near the elevated train track coming from the back. And just use Lapis on all cosmonauts you can, specially heavy ones. Remember they'll focus on you.
Do keep summoning exoskeletons to your back when you can, they'll come handy at the end.
Om wave 2 abuse the Phobos (try not to hit your tanks, but they will die pretty fast anyway) to kill ants.
On wave 3 is important to have bulge ready to immediately use on sniper cosmonaut. Kill the 2nd from left, then the 4th from left, either with bulge or lapis. The voice lines will say the snipers are in the buildings but considering how much you should have abused the phobos, they're likely all on the ground π. Help your guys with heavies, save bulge laser.
On wave 4 the 2 large anchors will drop. Hit the left one (NOT the right one) with the bulge laser, and at this point if you did things right the mission is won. You should have most NPC squads alive, and 2 or 3 of the NPC exoskeletons still fighting too. Enter the first exoskeleton you summoned, and proceed forward. Don't shoot anything for now! Enemies will ignore you if you don't hit them. Capture the WD squad. Proceed to the area with the loot, pick all you can rapidly to give health to your small squad but more importantly to make more crates drop when the last enemies die.
Your other NPCs will certainly handle the remaining heavies from wave 3, and all the enemies from the 5th wave. If they don't the Powered Exoskeleton Nix ZC will come in handy.
If you're still out of the exoskeleton when wave 5 arrives be careful with 2 frogs with plasma cannons that will come from the far left, these will likely focus on you and it's easy to be heavily damaged by them. There's also another 2 coming from the right, and any of these 4canwalk around all over the map and insta kill you.
Walk around, pick weapon crates, your NPCs will only hit anchor when tadpoles spawn from it. You can pick all remaining ones and they will massacre everything that will come out of the anchor. You can expect 1 weapon crate per wave. When bored or want to end the mission, just destroy the anchor and finito.
My main error was to capture NPCs. The chances you'll kill yourself with them it's huge. They're a nuisance at start instead of helping.
More heads on approach:
EDIT
You can use a Blacker instead of a Nix. E9 is great due to speed. But curiously can be more troublesome precisely due to the speed and efficiency of the Blacker picking crates. Also remember Blackers don't have much armor. As a last resort, escape to road at edge of map with WDs, use bulge on remaining anchor and deal with remaining cosmos with Phobos / Lapis.
